Hybrids
by InkheartFirebringer
Summary: What if Bella had already known about vampires when she had come to Forks? And what would the Cullens make of her half-vampire sister? Jasper and Emmett think they've found the solution to questioning the elusive teenager and possible threat; kidnap her.
1. One Of A Kind

**Disclaimer: I only own a few characters; everything recognisable belongs to Stephenie Meyer.**

Chapter One: One Of A Kind

I lifted the luggage off the conveyor belt that was crawling slowly around the room and suppressed a sigh of irritation at its lack of speed. Patience was not a quality I had in abundance.

"Elimira! I got the last bag!" My little sister, Kaitlin, danced through the crowd towards me, or rather tried to, hampered as she was by the suitcase she was lugging.

"Good," I growled shortly as I effortlessly lifted the heavy case and dumped on the trolley. Airports were not good places for vampires. Even if they were only half vampires like me. After spending several hours crammed into what amounted to small metal tube hurtling through the sky, in close quarters with several hundred humans all breathing the same air as I was, I wasn't in the best state of mind. A short man, who looked nearly as ill-tempered as I felt, shoved past my sister and I. Hard. I didn't stagger like a human would have done; like Kaitlin did, and I caught her before she fell. My fragile patience snapped and I snarled; a low snarl that didn't reach anyone else's ears. The man froze and I, with my superior vampiric eyesight, saw with satisfaction that the hairs on the back of his neck and arms rose in fright.

"Mira!" hissed Kaitlin quietly. "Remember Bella said to be careful!"

"I know the rules," I muttered, still watching the man with narrowed eyes as he stumbled away on legs suddenly numb with terror. I pondered that if I had been a full vampire his instincts would have warned him to give me a wide berth. As it was, my half human side was enough for him to lose that cautious edge and that would have given me the perfect hunting advantage. Too bad I didn't hunt humans. "I can take insults to myself but I won't stand for them to you; you and Bella both are far too delicate to be shoved around."

Kaitlin laughed, her bright child's laugh cutting through the low buzz of dull conversation from straggling groups of tired travellers. "We're only delicate to _you_, Mira," she said waggling her eyebrows in a way that was meant to be reproving but came off as simply cute and endearing.

I laughed inwardly. Yes, to me and to every other vampire in the world. They had no idea how fragile they really were in comparison. That was why I took it upon myself to be their protector; I couldn't bear the thought of living without them. It was the same reason I didn't hunt humans; I loved my sisters too much to put any kind of fear or distrust in their minds – emotions that would surely result from me murdering others of their kind.

I noticed Kaitlin's attention had wandered during my inner ramblings and she was craning her head, up on her tiptoes in an attempt to see further. "Where's Bella?" she asked, rotating in a circle. "Shouldn't she be back by now?"

My head snapped up instantly, searching the slow-moving masses for my older sister, a surge of anxiety sweeping through me.

"I'm right here," said an amused voice behind us and I whipped around, relief flooding me as I spotted Bella's waist-length sweep of mahogany curls. She emerged from behind a portly woman pushing an over-stuffed case, her pale skin – almost as pale as mine, vampire pale – and slim figure even more pronounced next to the large lady whose cheeks were flushed red from exertion. Bella's bright, intelligent brown eyes brimmed with laughter as she took in our worried, crowd-searching stances. "I wasn't gone that long you know," she said.

"Well it _seemed _like a long time to me," declared Kaitlin and I opened my mouth to disagree. Sometimes though, it seemed as though Bella didn't just have vampire skin but vampire speed as well. She cut me off quickly, before an argument could develop and hurried us along. "Come on, I did actually find Charlie you know; he's patiently waiting outside in the pouring rain for us."

xxx

We pulled up in front of Charlie's house in his police cruiser (cringe, cringe) and we all piled out. Charlie looked a little overwhelmed with the flurry of activity, clearly used to solitary living for a long while, whereas Bella, who was of the same disposition but long since used to it, merely looked resigned. Kaitlin and I whirled around, moving cases, arguing at the tops of our voices and generally making a nuisance of ourselves as Charlie unlocked the door. However, with Bella's coaxing we (and all our various bags) had made it indoors and into the correct rooms within half an hour. Of course, vampiric speed hadn't hurt the amount of time taken.

Charlie didn't know about vampires; to him I was Phil's daughter from a previous wife, before he met Renee. But the truth was that Phil was a vampire who had fallen in love with a human; my mother, Renee. She already had two daughters by Charlie when they met, Bella aged ten and Kaitlin aged two, but when she had met Phil and fallen in love despite the fact he was a vampire, Renee had become pregnant again. Only this time, with a half-vampire child, one that she refused to get rid of, no matter how pain it had caused her. I have never stopped feeling guilty for this – the pain only increases when I know I also feel glad she didn't give up on me.

The violence of my birth meant that my mother would have died if my father hadn't changed her into a vampire, but Mom insists that she doesn't blame me for anything and regrets nothing; she firmly states that she has gotten three beautiful daughters and a wonderful mate out of life.

As I pondered over our patchwork of a family, a volley of excited barking greeted me along with the clattering of claws on wooden flooring. A black Labrador hurtled into my arms. Onyx wasn't really an adult yet but neither was she a pup anymore. Her long gangly legs still tripped her up and her skinny body wiggled, as if wagging her long whippy tail wasn't enough to convey her joy at seeing us.

"Onyx!" Kaitlin squealed joyfully and the Labrador instantly transferred her affection to my little sister, who was actually technically older than me.

I grinned and brushed the dog hair off my clothes before heading off to help Bella with dinner.

"What, no raw venison tonight?" I murmured to Bella as I went ninja on some onions.

Bella smiled and shook her head in mock reproach. "Sorry, Mira. No bloody steaks at the dinner table."

"Dang," I sighed. "And I was so looking forward to it."

Bella dropped her teasing and tilted her head closer to me, whispering, "If you want to get something to drink after dinner, Kaitlin and I will cover for you."

"Thanks." I meant it. It couldn't be easy, having a half-vampire for a sister. And by an unexpected twist of fate, Bella and Kaitlin were the only ones for whom I couldn't know this for certain, seeing as I couldn't read their minds. Yeah, like being a hybrid between two species didn't make me enough of a freak already; I could also hear the thoughts of anyone I chose. Apart from my sisters. Two silent spots in a sea of constant sound.

At first the never-ending chatter flowing through my head had driven me to the brink of insanity; my mother had ended up picking me up and just running. Renee had run with me cradled in her arms, never pausing until we were safely ensconced in the isolated vastness of the Alaskan forests. There, in the blissful silence, only broken by the gentle, unobtrusive thoughts of my mother and the very occasional hiker, I had pulled myself back from the edge and learned how to build a wall around my mind.

We had edged our way back into civilisation slowly, each trip into a busy area helping me gain a little more strength, holding onto my mental walls for longer before they crumbled under the pressure of the thoughts pressing in on me.

Eventually, two months after Renee had dropped everything to carry me to safety, my control had reached the point where I could hold the walls around my mind in place without conscious effort, and we had returned to my worried sisters and father.

"Mira! The onions are burning!" Bella yelped and I was forcibly dragged from the past, back into the present as I flew around the kitchen, rescuing vegetables.

As we sat down to eat a plateful of fajitas each, I felt a flare of love as I watched my family. Kaitlin, her shoulder-length blonde hair flying about as she gestured wildly, talking enough for all four of us. Charlie, though no real blood (ha-ha, yes, hilarious isn't it?) relative of mine, wore the slightly stunned expression of the mildly concussed as he listened to Kaitlin chattering endlessly. Bella, quietly eating and watching Charlie trying to adjust to Kaitlin, with silent mirth. Our eyes met, and we shared a look of exasperated amusement.

Sometimes I liked the fact I couldn't hear my sisters' thoughts. I felt I owed them at least that much, the privacy I denied everyone else, considering how much my arrival had shattered the normality of their lives. Thanks to me, our mother was now a vampire and fought a constant battle not tear out the throats of her first two daughters.

This, incidentally, was exactly why we were here. Phil had taken Renee on a six-month globetrotting trip, to help her try to hone the control of her thirst the point where she could go for weeks without feeding. After all, he had done the same when he had first met her. Phil had restrained himself from draining another human for as long as he could, and his feedings had become few and far between out of respect for Renee.

I could only marvel at his self-control. To be a full vampire, in close contact with Renee and to not have fed for weeks – I knew exactly how it felt, having lifted the sensation directly from his mind. It wasn't something I was in a hurry to remember.

I was lucky enough to have the choice. My half-and-half heritage meant I could survive solely on human food for months at a time without having to have blood. Not that I didn't crave it. After about the eight-week mark, the only humans safe around me were Bella and Kaitlin. Not even my thirst could induce me to ever harm them.

Later that night, when Bella, Kaitlin and Charlie were safely tucked up in bed and fast asleep, I snuck out. Flowing down the wall of the house like liquid moonlight and sprinting through the dark faster than the human eye could follow; I headed out of Forks on my way to Seattle. Or more specifically, its blood bank. Five minutes later, I arrived and one more minute after that, I emerged from the building, undetected and laden with quietly swishing bags.

Stopping in a deserted stretch of forest on the way back to Charlie's house, I ripped open and tipped bag after bag down my parched throat. It was only when my eager hands reached for the next bag and found that there was none left, did I come back to my senses. I slowly – human slow – gathered up the bags, fighting the primeval urge to lick the plastic clean of every single last drop. I stopped by the hospital in Forks to dump the empty blood bags in their dumpsters, where that kind of trash wouldn't look out of place, then made my way home.

As I curled up under the covers in my bed, I gave in and allowed the disgust to sweep over me. The human part of me had gagged at every mouthful I had swallowed but I couldn't deny that my vampire side had been ecstatic. That the blood hadn't tasted heavenly, more delicious than mint chocolate ice cream, pepperoni pizza and ice-cold Coke could ever be. The knowledge was bitter ashes in my mouth, despite the fact I could still feel the fizzing of the stolen blood in my veins and its sweet residue on my lips. I licked them unconsciously, feeling the ghostly tingle of the blood I had just consumed on my tongue again.

_You're so pathetic_, my conscience mocked. _Thinking you're better than other vampires, just because you don't directly kill anyone. As if you don't enjoy the taste and crave it more strongly than any drug. People might still die; people who needed the blood in that bank, the blood which you just stole._

I squeezed my eyes tight shut as I argued with myself. _People would have _definitely_ died if I hadn't. We start school tomorrow and I haven't fed for months. I wouldn't have been able to resist._ My conscience said nothing more; just silently mocked my weakness.

I'd have to begin raiding blood banks a lot more often too. My stomach clenched, in a mixture of dread and (unwanted) anticipation. Regular human contact meant there was no way I could abstain for months at a time.

I fell asleep, dreaming of mint chocolate ice cream, pepperoni pizza, ice-cold Coke and bags of blood.

xxx

The next morning I couldn't look my sisters in the eye, knowing that I had drank human blood last night and had thoroughly enjoyed every single drop.

Bella and Kaitlin instantly recognised the signs and comforted me wordlessly. A touch on the arm, a gentle smile with my plate of eggs, a quick hug as I waited for the toast to pop. I didn't deserve such understanding sisters; it only made me love them all the more, even if I couldn't imagine where they drew such tolerance from.

Kaitlin chattered all the way to school, while Bella drove her new truck (a present from Charlie) with her customary silence and concentration. I sat between them feeling unexpectedly nervous. I'd never been to school before.

We dropped Kaitlin off at her school with a flurry of instructions about where to meet at the end of the day, and then continued onto to Forks High School.

After we had pulled into the parking lot and ran through the rain, we entered the front office to announce ourselves.

"Isabella and Elimira Swan," the secretary, Mrs Cope, said, glancing at the pile of papers on her desk. "Welcome to Forks High School. How are you finding Forks?"

_Wet. Cold. Green. _These were the adjectives that immediately sprang to mind but I resisted the temptation to say them out loud. I imagined that even less favourable ones were running through Bella's head and thinking of this, I managed a genuine smile as I went with the total lie of, "It's lovely."

Bella shot me a grateful glance, having saved her the trouble of struggling to find a compliment, and the even trickier task of sounding sincere (she's not a very good liar).

"Good, good," Mrs Cope said smiling as she handed us our timetables. "Since you girls are both seventeen, you have a couple of classes together, though hopefully you'll make friends quickly too and don't have to rely on each others' company."

_Not likely_. Even though I couldn't read Bella's mind, I knew we shared this sentiment. Bella was solitary by nature and it wasn't safe for anyone else to get too close to me.

We thanked her and headed to our first class. The reason that this was the first time I had attended school was because I had finally stopped growing. It appeared that half-vampires reached maturity after seven years but during those years I had gained the physical body of seventeen or eighteen year old. My parents had been worried at first about my rapid rate of growth but it had slowed and eventually stopped four or five months ago. It was safe to send me to school now that there wasn't my unexplainably accelerated growth to try to hide. However, this was a never-ending source of complaint for Kaitlin; that it had taken just seven years for me to grow up completely, that she was still only nine, whereas Bella was seventeen and I easily passed for that.

"What do you think Mrs Cope would say if you told her you were actually only seven, not seventeen?" Bella asked as we took seats next to each other in English.

I blinked in surprise. "That was eerie, Bells. Are you sure _you_ aren't the mind reader? And she'd probably consign me to a psychiatric ward."

The day passed in a blur until lunch. I found myself pleasantly surprised with my ability to cope with the level of the subjects I was studying. Guess my quick vampire brain helped a lot; everything was new and I devoured the knowledge on offer in every class with eagerness.

I was also thankful I had fed last night. The press of students that constantly surrounded Bella and I all morning, curious about the new girls, would have probably overwhelmed me otherwise. As it was, I gritted my teeth and bore it. _You'd be proud of me Dad._

As the pair of us walked to lunch, in between two girls called Lauren and Jessica and surrounded by several others, I became aware for the first time that male contact in my short seven years had been severely limited. To my father and on a couple of occasions, Charlie. This left me wondering how to deal with the increasing problem of what do about the eyes of the boys that had been studying me religiously, almost all day. Hmm.

In terms of help, Kaitlin was out, Charlie was definitely out, Bella was not likely to be very helpful seeing as her dating history wasn't very long, and my parents were _somewhere_ on a very large planet, and completely without communication in any case. Which drew up the entire list of people I knew. Which was kind of sad, now I thought about it.

Of course, I was aware that I was beautiful, by human standards anyway. All vampires were beautiful; I had grown up with this as a fact, like the fact I shared Bella's and Renee's gorgeous mahogany hair and Kaitlin's and Phil's vibrant forest-green eyes.

But whereas I was far from being the most attractive when amongst vampires, I was just beginning to realise that the opposite was true when I placed among humans. I couldn't deny that being found beautiful was enjoyable but I could also see this causing me a lot of problems in the near future. Oh, goody._ Sorry boys, you can't date me; it's not you, it's me. Seriously. Unless you're also vampires and feel the urge to rip people's throats out if they get too close, which you're not, 'cause trust me – I'd know._

I was so busy internally composing future conservations that it wasn't until I had walked into the cafeteria and taken a seat between Bella and a boy named Mike, that I noticed them. Or rather, their fragrance.

All the tiny hairs rose on my smooth white arms as I inhaled the scents of several hundred humans and _five full vampires_. I turned casually in my seat and saw them. They sat at a table by themselves; three males and two females. The females were opposites – one was long, lean and blond, the other petite, pixyish and with hair black as pitch. But it was the males that caused the bone-deep fear, the ice condensing in the pit of my stomach. One was smaller than the others, more boyish; I estimated he couldn't have been older than Bella when he was turned. He had a mop of bronze-coloured hair, but despite the fact he had less bulk than the other males, there was still something intimidating about him. The second was massive, muscled like he had been an intensive weight-lifter before he was turned and had dark, curly hair. The last was taller, leaner; still muscular but in a sinewy way, like a swordfighter instead of a wrestler. My mouth went completely dry when I saw the scars trailing out from under his honey-blond hair. They covered his arms, neck and jaw; hundreds of scars in the shape of an all-too-familiar crescent. Hundreds of vampires had tried to kill him and just as many had died in the attempt.

I sat in my seat, every restraint I could summon locking me in place.

_Flee!_ Every sense I possessed was screaming at me, my dual natures for once in complete agreement on what my course of action should be. My human half was terrified at being trapped in a enclosed space with five unknown vampires, at least two of whom were clearly able to kill me with very little effort, and my vampire half wasn't handling the idea much better.

For the first time I was glad I was seven and that wishing desperately for my mother to appear was allowed. Five vampires together! My parents had told me vampires were usually solitary, apart from mated pairs. Why were they here, banded together in such a large group?

I scanned their eyes and went even colder as I realised they all shared deep black irises. They were ravenous. Maybe the school was about to become an all-you-can-eat-buffet and they had gathered for a feast. Maybe they could get away with this in such isolated areas and they would burn the school to ground, claiming the occupants had died in a tragic fire.

I could feel the fear clenching in a big knot in my stomach. Five starving vampires gorging themselves on a couple of hundred students? I had heard stories even worse than this from Phil.

Bella! Panic seared through my head as I looked at my sister. As greatly outmatched as I was, my fully human sister was infinitely more vulnerable. Just I began to frantically plan how to sent Bella away without it looking suspicious, I heard her ask, "Who are _they_?"

I realised my sister had already clocked the vampires and seemed to be handling it a lot better than me. But, as I knew firsthand, she and Kaitlin both had a freakily high tolerance rate. Only these vampires weren't family and probably couldn't care less about some human.

As Jessica opened her mouth to reply to Bella, I saw the bronze-haired male flick his gaze to her and then away again. It was the first movement any one of them had made, apart from when the dark-haired female had left a minute ago, and it made me jump slightly, as tense as I was. Odd; it was almost as though he'd known Jessica was about say his name, which she did in the next second.

"That's Edward and Emmett Cullen..."

I continued listening to Jessica while surreptitiously watching the mysterious 'Cullens'. My confusion only deepened when I heard they'd moved here two years ago from Alaska. So maybe they weren't here for a feeding frenzy after all. But why else would five vampires group together, especially such thirsty ones? Why were they going to _school_? Why did they bother living amongst humans? I did certainly; but my sisters held me here. What held them?

_You utter moron_, my brain mocked me. _You have the power to find out, idiot!_ I suddenly realised all I had to do was drop the walls around my mind and listen in to their thoughts, gleaning some knowledge that way.

I took a deep breath and warily lowered the shields, which I had grown so used to holding around my mind that I no longer had to give them conscious thought. The flood of thoughts of several hundred students cascaded through my head like a waterfall and I struggled through them with a gasp of surprise. It had been a long time since I had last lowered my walls in such a busy area.

I eventually found what I was looking for and sheer shock made me freeze. For the first time I read the thoughts of another mind reader. My head snapped up at the same instant as his did and the bronze-haired male and I locked gazes across the room, black eyes meeting green. For an instant I saw his expression of shock, identical to the one that I was pretty sure I wore and felt the odd sensation of hearing every thought in the room twice; through my own power and through his. Then as the other three occupants of his table looked in my direction, following his suddenly alert stance, I brought the walls around my mind slamming back up into place. If anything he looked even more shocked than before.

The bell trilled shrilly, signalling the end of lunch, and I silently apologised for the cliché, as I thought, _Saved by the bell_.

"C'mon Bella," I murmured, skilfully manoeuvring us so that I walked between her and the unknown vampires. "Biology for you, History for me." But as we walked away I felt something bump against my mental walls. Looked like the bronze-haired male was the persistent sort. Oh hell.

**A/N: If you liked it (or even if you didn't) please review! Constructive critisism only please!**


	2. And Then There Were Four

**Disclaimer: I only own a few characters; everything recognisable belongs to Stephenie Meyer.**

Chapter Two: And Then There Were Four

I sat in my seat in History, utterly rigid. Before lunch I would have been interested in the lesson. Now all thoughts were focused on the dire situation Bella and I had somehow landed in. It didn't help that the pixie-like vampire was sitting all of two seats behind me. I could feel her gaze burning holes in the back of my head and it distinctly unnerved me. I kept having to fight the urge to turn around, to keep her in my line of vision, instead of presenting her with my unprotected back.

My thoughts chased each other in circles and I fought against the blind panic. Another mind reader! If I'd only known, I wouldn't have drawn attention to myself by dropping my mental barriers. Now he knew that _I_ was a mind reader and he knew that I knew that _he_ was a mind reader.

Thank heavens it had been only been a split second of contact; he couldn't possibly have gained any other knowledge. I hoped not, as I was counting on the fact that these vampires wouldn't know that I was a half-vampire. Apparently, even my parents had been shocked by my conception; they hadn't known it was possible for vampires and humans to interbreed. I was conscious that I was an anomaly in the vampire world and hopefully these vampires were just as unaware as most that hybrids were possible. If that was the case, they also probably would rule out the possibility of me being a vampire, which left only one option – a human. Then they might leave me alone if thought I was just a human; a freaky one, with a seriously strange mind but just a human. And if they ignored me, then my sisters were safe too.

There were too many 'ifs' and 'mights' in that line of thinking for my liking and I continued to fret ceaselessly over everything I didn't know and the gaping flaws in my plans.

The clock's second hand seemed to drag around so slowly that I actually began wondering whether the thing was broken or not. I glanced at it again; still half of this lesson and the whole of P.E. to get through before we could leave.

I hadn't felt the brush of the other mind reader's consciousness trying to breach my walls since about five minutes into the History lesson. Perhaps it was safe to try and sneak a peek at his thoughts, to see whether he suspected me of anything. I breathed in and out, trying to focus and calm myself, ready to retreat behind my shields at a moment's notice. I deliberately made my mind go blank, pushing all potentially dangerous information to the back of my head, and then let my mind become submerged in the rush of thoughts surrounding me.

The ones that leapt out at me instantly were the thoughts of the petite, dark-haired vampire sitting several seats behind me. Her mind was like that of my parents; sharp and clear, thoughts like quicksilver. Her attention was divided between intense curiosity as she stared at the back of my head and an odd collection of images that she kept rifling through, too fast to follow, accompanied by the occasional frustrated thought like, "_Why can't I _see_ her?" _and "_I hope Jazz is holding on okay; I definitely don't want _that_ to come to pass."_

Her thoughts were intriguing and I was almost distracted from my mission, until I caught the wisp of a thought in the background.

I found myself on my feet, without being quite sure how I got there, my chair clattering against the desk behind it. The low murmur of conversation in the class died instantly.

"Miss Swan?" the teacher asked, staring at me in surprise.

"May I be excused? I think I'm going to be sick," I said, a hint of desperation slightly colouring my voice. It wasn't a lie.

"Oh, right, of course."

I hurried through the classroom as quickly as was humanly acceptable, hyper-aware of the eyes of the pixie-like vampire following me. As the door clicked shut behind me, I abandoned all caution and ran, vampire-fast, down the corridors and outside, sprinting for the science labs. As I raced across the grass faster than I had ever done in my entire life, the terrible thought that had caught my attention replayed itself over and over again in my head like a scene from a horror movie.

I threw open the outside door, dashed inside and slid open the door to the Biology classroom. A roomful of students and one teacher stared at me but I only had eyes for my sister. Bella looked as surprised as the rest, but before I could say anything, the biology teacher, Mr Banner asked, "Excuse me, can I help you?"

_Yes; conveniently suffer memory loss while I have a showdown with another vampire._

"Yes, please; I'm feeling unwell and the nurse says my sister needs to drive me home." I was surprised how calm and composed I sounded as I lied smoothly; I felt anything but.

Mr Banner would have scored high on a gullibility test but instead of contempt, I was suffused with gratefulness as he blinked and said, "Oh, I see. Miss Swan?"

Bella got up from her seat and edged between the desks towards me. I wanted to scream at her to hurry, that every second in this room was dangerous but I forced myself to remain still and silent. When she crossed the threshold of the classroom, effectively placing me between the danger and herself, I breathed a sigh of relief.

"Thank you, Mr Banner."

"You're welcome, Miss Swan."

As I pulled the door shut, my gaze swept the room and l locked stares with _him_. All pretence of humanity had fallen away. His black eyes burned with bloodlust and he looked on the verge of leaping from his seat to come after us. I fought back a shiver as I closed the door to the classroom, cutting off the view of his face contorted in an inaudible snarl.

"What –?" Bella started to ask, confusion evident on her face, but I quickly hushed her and pulled her through the outside door.

A few minutes later, we were both sliding into her truck. I had insisted on driving and my hands shook slightly, almost fumbling the key before I got it in the ignition. I pulled out onto the main road and finally released my breath.

Any doubts I had had as to whether these vampires were a danger to us had vanished the instant I had glimpsed the thoughts of the bronze-haired mind-reader. The image of Bella –no matter the fact it was only being imagined, not actually happening – being hunted in a multitude of ways by a vampire intent on draining her dry, had nearly caused me a terror-induced heart attack.

I stared at the road, truly feeling sick with worry as I remembered the echo of his intense hunger. I was petrified that he would come after us anyway; now that I was past that first panicked rush that had just screamed to get Bella _away,_ I realised that he had been planning strategy. The bronze-haired male was targeting Bella for some reason in particular and he would come after her whether she was at home or at school.

"Mira?" asked Bella quietly. I glanced across at my sister, knowing my anguish was evident in my face. She was waiting patiently for an explanation, trusting that I had known what I was doing when I had pulled us out of school. I bit my lip and told her the truth she was owed; that one of the vampires at lunch was a mind reader, that he knew _I_ was a mind reader and that for some reason he was targeting her in particular, preparing for the hunt.

Bella took this with unnatural calm and I watched warily, waiting for the realisation to sink in. When she still said nothing, I said attempted to reassure both her and myself, "Don't worry, Bella. As long I still breathe, he won't harm you."

"I'm not worrying." Her voice was quiet but confident. "I trust you Mira."

I was once again overwhelmed by the confidence and belief my sisters had in me; something I didn't think I deserved. But I would try. As incomprehensible as their trust in me was, I would try to be worthy of it.

"Oh, hell!" I stomped hard on the brakes and the truck screeched to a rusty halt. "Kaitlin!"

"What? What's wrong?" Bella asked, panic in her tone for the first time, not for herself but for Kaitlin.

"She won't get out of school for another hour!" I stared wide-eyed at Bella. "How can I protect you both at once? I'll need to leave you at the house alone while I pick her up!"

Bella relaxed instantly. "Get driving," she said sternly, pointing at the road.

I unconsciously obeyed the familiar tone as she shook her head. "I'll be fine; you can run there and back in under a minute."

I almost exploded. "A minute! A vampire doesn't even need a minute to break your neck and drain you dry!" I instantly regretted the harshness of my tone and words as Bella flinched. She was being incredibly brave about this.

Ten exceedingly long minutes later, I pulled up in front of Charlie's house, utterly mystified. Bella had once again backed me into a corner – this time over the Kaitlin pick-up issue – and I had no idea how she'd done it. Bella went into kitchen to start preparing dinner, as if it were any other normal day. I followed her like an over-protective shadow, pacing restlessly up and down like a caged lion, until Bella complained I was wearing a hole in the floor.

So I retreated outside and started running in a wide circle around the house, straining my ears to pick up the sounds of any approaching vampires. As my feet pounded the floor, my thoughts pounded against the inside of my head.

_What the hell am I going to do?_ That was the most urgent one. All my instincts screamed to grab Bella and run. But that would be leaving Charlie and Kaitlin unprotected. If the bronze-haired male followed our scents he would run across them first and he might stop for a snack before the main course. I couldn't carry all three of them; besides where could we run? Where was safe to hide? There were five full vampires together; they would easily track our scents, I wouldn't be able to outrun them carrying passengers and there was no way I could match even one of them in a fight. My frustration and fear made me want to snarl and scream. The only true safety I had ever known was with my parents, but even if I had been able to find them, I knew would only be endangering them too. Renee was no fighter and while Phil was a strong, capable combatant, he wouldn't survive five-to-one odds.

As my thoughts slowed, so did my footsteps. I got slower and slower, dropping to human speed, then walking, then faltering to a complete stop. I stared unseeing into the trees around me. It was obvious that we wouldn't be able to escape this by running to a non-existent place of safety. So that left staying put. Perhaps I couldn't outmatch them physically – full-vampires were a little faster and stronger than me – but I had my mental skills. The other mind-reader hadn't seemed to know how to shield his thoughts and I now wondered if maybe he didn't have the other odd little side-affect of my thought-reading ability. A grim smile curled my lips. Flight was impossible, so I would fight; in any way I could.

xxx

"Pick up, pick up, pick up," I chanted to my phone.

"Hello, Mira," Kaitlin chirped cheerfully into her phone. "How are –?"

"Are you at the school gates?" I interrupted anxiously.

"Yes," she answered, sounding startled. "Why, do y –?"

"I'm coming, see you, bye!" I called and hung up. I could almost hear her squawk of indignation. I dropped the phone on the table, forced myself to count to ten and then raced out of the front door. Twenty three and seven-eighths of a second later I arrived at Kaitlin's school. I hopped up and down, vibrating with impatience as Kaitlin said goodbye to a pretty Japanese girl.

"What's going on, Mira?" Kaitlin's expression was very reminiscent of Bella the time Kaitlin and I had promised not to prank anyone one April Fools Day; suspicious and disbelieving.

"Can't talk now." I swiftly pulled her off the pavement and into the surrounding trees. A split second later, we were running, Kaitlin curled against my shoulders like a misshapen backpack. We blurred into Charlie's garden at vampire speed and I slid gracefully to a stop in the kitchen.

Bella hadn't looked up from the chillies she was chopping as the front door banged shut behind us, but now she turned around and grinned. "Fifty-one seconds exactly, Mira. I'm impressed."

"_What _is going on?" Kaitlin all but demanded.

I left Bella with the unenviable task of explaining why I was going to be so unbearably over-protective for the rest of the foreseeable future, while I resuming my circuit of the house; running round and round the circle of ground I was determined to protect.

I was too on edge to stay still so I didn't stop moving until Kaitlin called down to me, demanding to be tucked into bed.

I fluidly scaled the two-storey building and wriggled through her window (a trick that never failed to delight her) and arranged the duvet to her satisfaction, pulling the covers up to her chin.

"Are there really strange vampires after us?" Her large green eyes regarded me solemnly from behind a few strands of blonde hair that had fallen across her face. "Bella said one of them was a mind-reader and he is hunting her."

I sighed. "Yes."

"Why?" Her voice was plaintive and childish. "Why would they do that?"

I sighed more deeply. "Not all vampires are like Mom and Dad. _They_ love us. To other vampires, we're just food. Dad thinks that even I might be regarded as such; after all the blood I was born with still flows through my veins. Perhaps Bella's scent just appealed to that vampire; or perhaps when he noticed that I was mind-reader too, he decided to hunt her just to get to me. I don't know. All I'm sure of is that other vampires can't be trusted, just like Mom and Dad said. All today did was prove it."

Kaitlin seemed to contemplate this for a few minutes. "It's not fair."

_Life's not fair. Tell me about it._

xxx

Morning had arrived. And we were all still breathing. As Charlie mumbled a greeting to me on the way out the door (having had no idea that I had been outside the full night), I wandered into the kitchen and slid into a seat next to Kaitlin.

Bella and I had a massive argument during breakfast – which, of course, she won – about going to school. Sitting in the truck, on the way there, she patiently reiterated her line of reasoning as I gritted my teeth and tried not imagine all the ways in which this could go horrifically wrong. According to Bella, since we were not attacked last night, it was unlikely it would happen today, in front of witnesses.

All day long, I sat on tenterhooks throughout all my classes, every sense straining to the utmost to detect any sign of an impending attack. Every sense except one. I was wary of dropping the walls around my mind again, afraid of what I would see, or rather who would see _me._

Nothing happened.

Then lunchtime rolled around and when I walked into the cafeteria, I stopped dead. Only four of the five vampires sat at the table they had shared yesterday. The bronze-haired mind-reader was absent.

What did _this_ mean? My brain screamed in frustration at receiving only more questions instead of answers. As a million different ideas flickered through my head, each one discarded quicker than the last, I started walking again. I collected my lunch mechanically and placed the tray on the table I had sat at yesterday, barely aware of surroundings except what was necessary to keep tabs on the four vampires on the other side of the room.

Bella slid into the seat next to me and subtly tilted her head towards the vampire table.

"And then there were four," she murmured.

**A/N: Thank you to everyone who left reviews for my first chapter; I loved reading them! I apologise for the extreme lateness of this chapter; I'm going to try to post every Saturday or Sunday from now on. **

**Please review! Thanks. :)**


	3. Friend or Foe?

**Disclaimer: I only own a few characters; everything recognisable belongs to Stephenie Meyer.**

**(Also, sentences written in italics are thoughts and sentences in bold are words written down on paper.)**

Chapter Three: Friend or Foe?

One day passed, then a second, then a third. The mind-reader did not return to school and the other vampires made no aggressive moves towards us.

I was baffled. My original thought was that the mind-reader was out hunting Bella, and was somehow, impossibly, unable to pick up her scent. But if that were the case, why did the other four vampires not simply inform him that she was here?

By the time day four had rolled around with no sign of the bronze-haired male, I was utterly confused, both as to what was going on and what I should be doing or feeling.

Bella and Kaitlin were confident the danger had passed, that I had perhaps mistaken his intentions. I simmered quietly with anger. His thoughts had been permanently seared onto my brain; there was no way I had mistook his murderous feelings towards Bella.

I continued my protective circling of our house, despite my sisters' protests. I was lucky that I could go for far longer without sleep than a human could before I dropped from exhaustion. I survived on catnaps, an hour here and there.

I was a confused tangle of emotions; fear, worry, anger, protective love and frustration. The emotional stress of this was far harder than the physical toll taken on me by lack of sleep and constant running. Should I still be scared? Should I take my sisters' advice and just drop it? The uncertainty as to what I should be doing and as to what was going on was driving me crazy.

Then I walked into the cafeteria on the lunchtime of the seventh day and stopped so suddenly the two girls behind me, Jessica and Lauren, almost collided with me.

"Hey, Elimira!" giggled Jessica, half-amused, half-annoyed. "Watch where you're going!"

"Mira, just Mira," I corrected her absentmindedly, staring across the cafeteria.

Lauren just glowered at me and flipped her sheet of pale blonde hair over one shoulder, before dragging Jessica away and muttering, "More like moron."

One small part of my mind made a mental note to beat her ass in the next P.E. class but the majority of my brain was focusing on looking calm and unflappable, while simultaneously not letting the vampire table out of my sight. The table that once more held _five_ occupants.

I carefully chose a seat at the table we usually sat at, picking one that put me between Bella and the vampires and that also allowed me a side-on view of them. That way I didn't have my back to them and I could watch them without looking at them directly.

Bella leaned closer to me and breathed the words so quietly that they would have just been whispers of air to a human, but were still uncomfortably loud to my half-vampire ears. "Have you noticed?"

"Of course," I murmured back as quietly as was still possible for her to hear. I was acutely aware that our conversation would not be private with five vampires in the room.

Luckily, a girl called Angela drew Bella into a quiet discussion about some English project and I gave an inaudible sigh of relief. Anything to avoid drawing attention. I was on the verge of freaking out again. I had no idea what this new development signalled; it was like playing a game with half the rulebook missing.

Then I heard the first words any of them had spoken since I had entered the room; in fact since the entire week I had been here.

"Ease up, Edward. Honestly. So you kill one human. That's hardly the end of the world." It was massive muscular one, with the dark, curly hair, speaking with a hint of amusement in his voice.

My fists clenched under the table. _Hardly the end of the world to __**you**_, I thought venomously. If either of my sisters died, let alone were murdered, I don't know how I'd cope.

To my surprise, the bronze-haired mind-reader murmured back, "You would know."

The muscular one chuckled. "You've got to learn to get over things. Like I do. Eternity is a long time to wallow in guilt."

I bit back a snarl just as the tiny, dark-haired vampire who had been in my History class, tossed a handful of ice into his face.

The massive vampire looked surprised for a moment, then grinned. "You asked for it." He shook his hair in her direction and the two female vampires leaned back, away from the shower of slushy snow that flew out of his hair, squealing in protest. They all started laughing just as Bella looked over curiously at them.

I was surprised by their friendliness with each other; they had mostly been silent all week, only conversing between I guessed were their mated pairs. Perhaps it was the return of the bronze-haired vampire that caused their high-spirits?

Even as I thought that, he looked up, his eyes finding Jessica, then Bella. I wondered if he had heard Jessica thinking about him; I had had that problem often enough, looking up when someone thought my name rather than speaking it.

He continued staring at Bella; she instantly blushed and hid behind her sweep of mahogany curls. A low growl escaped from me before I could stop it and his eyes instantly snapped onto me instead. I felt a push against my mental walls again and glared at him before turning around, fixing my eyes determinedly on our table.

I seethed with anger that I had been crippled in this way; unable drop my shields and use my mind-reading abilities without fear he would do the same.

I looked over at Bella, wondering if her thoughts were 'audible' to him, when they were silent to me, and noticed she was still pink-cheeked.

I blinked in surprise, and then quickly scrawled a note on a paper napkin:

**Are you seriously blushing just 'cause he looked at you, Bells?**

Bella read the note and went even pinker. She took the pen and hastily scribbled back:

**Don't be ridiculous; I'm an easy blusher, you know that.**

I did, unfortunately. Early on, it had meant an even greater test of my control than the usual interactions with my sisters. I tilted my head and examined her expression closely. My eyes narrowed and I quickly jotted down:

**Do you like him? I mean, like, like?**

The tone of my note was faintly accusatory and Bella's reply seemed defensive:

**No! I don't even know him! I mean, he's absurdly good-looking, for obvious reasons, which is admittedly attractive but that's it.**

Jessica leaned over to Bella, who quickly covered our scribble-covered napkin, and whispered, "Edward Cullen is staring at you."

Bella stiffened slightly. "He doesn't look angry, does he?" she whispered back, a little worry seeping into her voice.

I snarled internally; I knew Bella had been more upset and afraid by the encounter in Biology than she was letting show, and had been trying to make light of it because she'd known precisely how I would react.

Jessica looked confused. "No. Should he be?"

Bella hesitated. She also knew that no conversation was private in the presence of vampires and besides, Bella couldn't exactly mention that she had been threatened by a 'mythological' creature anyway. "I don't think he likes me." A safe enough statement.

"The Cullens don't like anybody," Jessica said reassuringly. "Well, they don't notice anybody enough to like them. But he's still staring at you."

"Stop looking at him," Bella said anxiously, clearly worrying for Jessica's safety, rather than her own.

Jessica giggled but humoured her, turning away from the vampires' table.

For the rest of lunchtime, Bella and I steadfastly ignored the penetrating gaze of the mind-reader, and in my case, the persistent and increasingly annoying pushes against my mental shields.

At last the bell rang deafeningly and the cafeteria instantly was filled with the scraping of several hundred chairs being pushed back. I sprang to my feet eagerly, wishing that we could go home _now_; I was becoming weary of resisting the bronze-haired vampire's attempts to break into my thoughts. I was unpleasantly surprised to discover that it was harder to hold my walls in place when someone was actively trying to get past them.

"See you later, Bella," I said once we had reached the door of the cafeteria. My unease about leaving her unprotected for a whole hour in the Biology classroom suddenly swamped me again.

_Please be safe_, I pleaded her with my eyes.

Bella smiled reassuringly back at me and walked away towards the science labs.

xxx

**Edward's POV**

I watched the two girls walk away, through the doorway of the cafeteria. They were virtually undistinguishable from behind, at least to human eyes; both possessed waist-length mahogany-brown hair and there was only a centimetre or two of difference in height.

In reality, they couldn't be more different; at least to me.

One had seemed an unremarkable human. Now she fascinated me, reluctantly, with the power of her scent and the silence of her thoughts.

The other had been intriguing from the start, but not in the same way. The first girl's scent was the sweetest, most delicious thing I'd smelled in eighty years –

I swiftly clamped down on that thought and pushed it away as the fiery ache reignited in my throat.

The other's scent was...strange. Human...but almost...tainted somehow, swirled together with something that was too hard to pick out of the combination.

Her thoughts were also silent but again, not in the same way. Instead of seeming merely to be a blank, the second girl had an impenetrable wall surrounding her thoughts.

I'd tried pushing against the barrier, in an attempt to reach the thoughts beyond it, but the wall had refused to budge an inch, much to my frustration. Once, when I first saw her, it had seemed to vanish for a few moments and I heard the oddest, most confused cacophony of thoughts in her head, almost as if she had many multiple personalities all thinking at once.

She had seemed to almost sense my attempted intrusions, glaring at me across the room, angry, but I thought I also read a little fear in her eyes. Humans' instincts told them subconsciously that we _were_ to fear; though their conscious minds didn't realise what made them give us a wide berth. Despite her unusualness, this girl seemed no different in that respect.

I could feel my family watching me, their thoughts swirling quietly around me, waiting to see what I would do. Would I go to the Biology classroom, to test my restraint by gambling with the life of the human girl that I was trying so hard to save? Or would I admit defeat, that my control had been pushed enough for one day and just go home?

I wanted very badly not to have to run away. And I was unacceptably interested by her, by the seeming absence of her thoughts.

xxx

**Elimira's POV**

I drummed my fingers in an apprehensive, irritated rhythm against my desk. One minute until the bell sounded to signal the end of History.

I had spent the entire lesson endlessly fretting over my sister's safety and wondering whether her theory had been incorrect. Bella had insisted that I trust her intuition on this; that the vampire wouldn't attack her today.

I had deferred from ditching History class out of respect for her wishes but now I was wishing desperately that I hadn't made that promise. The fear for my sister's life was slowly driving me insane and the presence of the pixie-like vampire sitting behind me all lesson had done nothing to improve my mood either.

The bell rang shrilly and I was out of my seat in a flash, as quickly as was acceptable by human standards. I hurried to the P.E. building and an incredible wave of relief nearly brought tears to my eyes when I saw the figure of my sister, unharmed and waving, waiting for me there.

xxx

The next morning, when I opened my eyes, I tasted the frost in the air. I glanced across the room. Bella was a bump under the covers; the only part of her visible was the mass of brown curls poking out of the top of the duvet.

I scowled at the window. I had left it open a crack to keep the room cool (the bedroom had tendency to overheat, something to do with too much insulation in the walls) but I hadn't anticipated the even-lower-temperatures-than-normal for Forks.

I leapt out of bed, zipped across the room, shut the window, fastened the catch and jumped back into bed; all in under a second. I shuddered at the loss of heat and burrowed deeper under the covers, seeking the comfortable cocoon of warmth that had built up around me overnight.

I often wondered what quirk of biology had led to my body temperature. Vampires were cold, humans were warm, half vampire-half humans were...hot? If I had been asked to take guess I would have said that a hybrid would be lukewarm; not several degrees hotter than a human. It was simply bizarre. Or maybe it was just me. I'd never met another half-vampire, so I had no comparisons to draw.

"Mira!" Kaitlin bounded into the room, far too awake and far too cheerful for six 'o' clock in the morning. Onyx bounced along beside her, in a manner that suggested the Labrador's joints had been replaced by elastic bands.

"Go back to bed, Katy," I groaned, hiding under the pillow. I had been (reluctantly, at first) enjoying my first solid block of sleep in seven days; thanks to Bella, who had wore down my resistance to the issue. I had indeed been reassured by the fact she had survived an hour alone with the vampire, but it had only served to further confuse me.

He had had plenty of opportunities to kill her. He hadn't. From the way the muscular vampire had been talking, the other vampires were expecting him to kill her. He hadn't. Should I be on guard or not? I was weary of this mystery. What was he waiting for?

I walked Onyx, got all of us bundled into the truck, dropped Kaitlin off at her school and drew into the high school car park, fretting all the way about my complete lack of understanding of the situation. If he wanted my sister's blood, why was he hanging back? And why had he disappeared for a week?

I slammed the truck's door as I got out, frustrated beyond measure, and started to stride angrily in the direction of the school. I was halfway there when I realised Bella wasn't following me. I whirled around, suddenly afraid, but relaxed when I saw Bella clinging to the side of the truck, checking the snow-chains.

I had half-turned away again, when an agonisingly loud screech of brakes pierced my ears. I looked around to see a dark blue van skidding across the parking lot. _Heading straight towards Bella._

I didn't think, just reacted. I raced to Bella, invisibly quick; aware out of the corner of my eye that another figure was streaking inhumanly fast across the tarmac but disregarding it in the sudden all-consuming terror for my sister. I reached her just before the van and spun into a tight ball, lashing out with hands and feet. All four appendages hammered into side of the van, creating deep dents in the panels of the door and to my astonishment, two more thumps shook the frame of the van as it ground to a halt. A pair of white hands buried in the metal. I turned my head, to see the person who had aided in my rescue, and locked eyes with the bronze-haired vampire, his gaze steady as he held the van up with me with one hand and cradled Bella close to his side with the other.

**A/N: Thanks to everyone who reviewed the previous chapter; sorry that this is so late, life's been hectic :(. But I'm on holiday for a week now so I'll hopefully get some writing done!**

**Please review! Tell me if you liked Edward's POV and if you want more! Thanks. :)**


	4. Catastrophes and Clues

**Disclaimer: I only own a few characters; everything recognisable belongs to Stephenie Meyer.**

Chapter 4: Catastrophes and Clues

I stared at him in disbelief and incomprehension, so clearly there and somehow, impossibly, saving my sister's life. He stared right back at me, black eyes swimming with anxiety and frustration and _hunger_.

I was abruptly aware of Bella's proximity to him and was just about to reach out and pull her away, when she stirred.

"Bella?" he asked, his voice low, musical and inexplicably soft as he looked down at her. "Are you all right?"

Her eyes fluttered opened; she looked up at him and froze. She seemed to be locked in his onyx eyes, unable or unwilling to look away.

"I'm fine," Bella whispered back and the worry on his face melted into relief.

Mere seconds had passed since the van had collided with the end of Bella's truck and the parking lot around us now exploded with the screams and shouts of the other students, their cries of shock and fear ringing in the frosty air.

Bella seemed to make a conscious effort to tear her eyes from his face and she struggled to sit up. He slid away from her, scooting as far away as was possible in the small space.

I helped her sit up and tucked her protectively beside me, giving the mind-reader my best hard stare. A clear warning. Though, perhaps an unnecessary one? He _had_ just saved her life. I was unbelievably confused. This vampire was such a series of complete contradictions.

As the emergency services arrived and shifted a gap between the van, Bella's truck and the tan car right next to it, it began to dawn on me exactly how bad this was; in a multitude of ways.

As I deftly avoided examination by the medical services – wishing to spare them the heart attack sure to be brought on by the inhuman readings they would get from my body – I realised that there was no way the vampire could mistake me for a human anymore; not now that I had raced across the car park as swiftly as he had. Cold fear clenched my stomach as I climbed into the back of the ambulance, next to a loudly protesting Bella strapped to a stretcher.

I looked across the parking lot and briefly caught the eyes of three of the other vampires, expressions ranging from fury to disapproval, before the ambulance doors closed off my view.

When we arrived at the hospital, I shadowed my sister all the way to the ward where she was placed, afraid that this new revelation would somehow endanger her further. I was still pacing up and down at the end of her bed, when the bronze-haired vampire sauntered casually into the room.

I had been unsurprised to also see him talk his way out of an examination, to ride to the hospital up front with the driver, to sail through the entrance unhindered and then vanish into the depths of the hospital.

I _was_ surprised to see him here now. I had expected him to sneak out a backdoor and escape before someone insisted he be checked over. I was also not expecting another vampire to follow him into the room.

My breath froze in my throat. _Another_ one? It was unmistakably a different vampire from any of the five I had previously seen. He looked older than the others, about thirty maybe, and his hair was as blond as the exceptionally beautiful female vampire. How many vampires were there in this town? I was beginning to suspect some massive joke on a cosmic scale.

"This is my father, Carlisle," the mind-reader introduced Bella to the other vampire. "He's a doctor here."

_A DOCTOR! _I shrieked mentally. How was that even possible? How could a _vampire_ be a doctor, resist the siren call of the blood long enough to treat patients? Why did he even want to? Apart from my parents, vampires had no respect for human life.

I watch as the doctor vampire gently examined Bella, my thoughts swirling and colliding like a sea with the debris of a ship crashing through the waters. I didn't know what to think about these vampires anymore.

I sighed heavily and laid my head on my arms. Talk about mixed signals.

My sigh seemed to attract the doctor vampire's attention. "And how about you, Miss Swan?" he asked, scanning me with his eyes. "How are you?"

"I'm perfectly fine," I assured him, forcing a note of lightness into my voice.

"I'll just check –" his cold hand closed over my wrist, fingers wrapping around to measure my pulse.

"No!" I jerked my hand from his grip but I was too late. He was already regarding me with an expression of curiosity, which only intensified at my reaction.

I backed away a little, knowing he had felt my too-fast heartbeat, the rapid thrum-thrum-thrum that didn't belong to a human heart.

"Well," he said finally, still observing me with interest. The bronze-haired vampire hovered in the background, watching with an unreadable expression. "If you're sure. Do come back if you experience anything unusual."

_Define unusual._ I turned to a wide-eyed Bella, who had been watching the exchange anxiously. I knew she was worrying about me, worrying that the vampires would realise I was not human. "Let's go home, Bella."

xxx

**Alice's POV**

I sat gracefully at the dining room table, looking at my family with concern as they entered. We had driven back from school in complete silence but now we were home, I knew the explosion over Edward's actions today was inevitable.

I sighed wearily. Part of what I felt was frustration; it was first time I had ever been blinded in this way, unable to see Mira's future and how it would affect my family. It didn't help Edward was unable to read either Bella or Mira's thoughts. The other half of what I felt was fear; for what would happen if we were exposed as vampires but also for the safety of the two girls. I knew Jasper had his mind set on a violent solution to the problem of how much of Edward's abnormality Bella and Mira had noticed during the car crash.

Rosalie also was eager about this idea and I knew Emmett would feel obliged to take his mate's side.

The seven of us were ranged around the table like two armies drawing up battle lines. I knew Carlisle and Edward would not condone the girls' murder. Esme was most concerned about the possible damage to her family; she didn't want Bella and Mira to die but her family were always her first and foremost priority.

"We have to deal with this threat to our secrecy, Carlisle!" Rosalie slammed her hand down on the table. "Can't you see that?"

Carlisle shook his head and answered calmly, "Killing the two Swan girls in cold blood, just to ensure their silence? When we do not even know whether they noticed anything strange about Edward in the first place? Rosalie, you cannot possibly –"

"How could they not notice?" Rosalie interrupted furiously, her golden eyes glimmering with rage. "He ran – _ran_ – across the car park and stopped a van from crushing one of them using only his bare hands!"

"Rosalie." Carlisle's quiet but unyieldingly firm voice silenced her instantly. "Like I said, whether they speak their suspicions or not, does not matter. The risk they pose is negligible, in comparison to the greater risk; that if we kill to protect ourselves, we will lose the essence of who we are."

I could see Edward fighting to keep a smile of relief off his face, and I was secretly happy myself.

Rosalie subsided, grumbling, but I knew – I could _see_ – she would acquiesce to Carlisle's decision. Emmett patted her encouragingly. "It'll turn out fine, Rose."

I looked towards my beautiful husband, knowing where the conversation would head now.

"Jasper." Edward's voice was quiet but held an unmistakable challenge. "They won't pay for my mistake. I won't allow that."

"They benefit from it, then? They should have died today, Edward. I would only set that right."

I winced internally. I knew Jazzy sounded cruel but he had lived in war zones. He knew the consequences of breaking the rules.

"Actually, I don't think they would have." Edward sounded quietly confident. "I'm not at all convinced one of the girls is human."

There was dead silence for an instant; then Rosalie let out a derisive snort of laughter. "Edward, if wasn't for the fact it's impossible, I'd say _you_ were the one with the head injury."

"Edward?" Carlisle encouraged. "Go on. I'd like to hear why you think this."

Edward leaned forward, becoming animated as he talked. "Well, to start with there's her thoughts –"

"Oh, for God's sake Edward!" snapped Rosalie angrily. "You're unbelievable; any reason to explain away the fact there's _someone_ out there whose mind you can't read."

Edward bristled and retorted, "Hardly, Rosalie. I can't hear the other Swan girl's thoughts either but I'm pretty sure that _she_ is human."

"Hmm," Emmett hummed thoughtfully. "Why do you think that is?"

"I told you," Edward sighed, anger falling away to be replaced by the frustration that had occupied him so often of late. "I don't know why I can't read either of their minds. But it's not just that; she smells different too. You must have noticed."

"I did actually," Emmett was in agreement. "Human but also...strange. Like it's mingling with another scent. I thought I was imagining it."

Jasper and Rosalie nodded grudgingly; they too had noticed this. I smiled. At least they were agreeing on something.

"Well, there's that, but it was today that made me sure that she isn't what she seems. She wasn't actually standing with the other Swan girl when the van made its attempt on her life; she was almost at the school buildings. She, like me, ran across the car park to save her sister's life."

There was silence for a fraction of a second, then everyone began speaking loudly, all at once. Carlisle had to resort to a piercing whistle to gain quiet once more.

"I happen to agree with Edward," he said mildly. There were murmurs of surprise, raised eyebrows from Jasper and an angry hiss from Rosalie, who clearly believed Edward was making it up.

"When the girls were brought to the hospital today, Isabella agreed to examination readily enough. Elimira refused but not before I was able to take her pulse." Carlisle paused and looked around, eyes bright with his interest. "It was rapid – far, far too rapid to be human."

Rosalie uncrossed her arms, looking as though she were reluctantly reconsidering the idea. "Well, if she's not human, what is she? Not a vampire; clearly she has a pulse." She looked bitter as she said this and Emmett squeezed her in a reassuring hug. "Not one of the dogs from La Push either; they all died off years ago and she's also clearly female. Not a human, not a vampire, not a werewolf. What else is there?"

"That," said Carlisle thoughtfully. "Is the big question. I'd very much like to know."

Emmett chuckled, "Maybe we should just ask her."

Everyone in the room stared at him, including me.

"You mean just walk up and say, 'Excuse me, what species are you?'" asked Rosalie, her voice heavy with sarcasm.

"Yep," said Emmett, unaffected by the mocking tone. "Why not? We're all busy worrying about them finding out our secret; did you ever think if maybe the girl isn't human she might be able to tell we aren't either? That she might have known from the start?"

Jasper straightened up at this, frowning even more. "Maybe we have a different problem to deal with then, rather than simply exposure. She might be dangerous to us."

Emmett scoffed and flexed his considerable muscles. "As if! I'd like to see her try to take any of us down. Hey!" he suddenly grinned. "Maybe I should ask her for a fight, see if she's any good at sparring."

"Emmett!" Rosalie smacked him over the head with an encyclopaedia. "Can you please concentrate?"

"No, he may have a point, Rosalie," said Japer, still frowning. "We need to know what this girl is, if she's a danger. If Edward can't hear her and Alice can't see her, the only option we have left is to straight out ask her."

I sighed internally with a mixture of love and exasperation. I loved Jasper intensely but his past meant he was incredibly protective of me; he refused to let me live in danger, no matter how slight.

"No!" Rosalie protested incredulously. "If the girl doesn't know what we are at present, she would hardly be anything but suspicious if we ask her what species she is and if she had any intention of attacking us."

"Do you see another option?" asked Jasper with raised eyebrows.

Rosalie paused. "No," she reluctantly acknowledged, scowling. "But if she does know what we are, odds are that she'll be scared of us. How would we approach her?"

"Let's just kidnap her," suggested Emmett, grinning. "Even if she's fast enough to outrun a van, I doubt she'll beat a speeding vampire."

"Emmett!" protested Esme, speaking for the first time. "You can't frighten the child like that!"

Emmett shrugged. "If she sees us coming, I doubt she'll stop to listen. We could just kidnap her and explain our good intentions afterwards."

"Good intentions?" snorted Rosalie mirthlessly, "How can you promise that if she _is _a threat?"

There was silence for a few seconds. Then Carlisle spoke, "Then we'll escort her off our territory. If she insists on returning after that, we may have to consider a different approach." His voice clearly showed his reluctance for this.

"We're decided, then," Rosalie said, her tone suddenly businesslike, though tinged with smugness. "When shall we go?"

"No time like present," said Jasper briskly, straightening up from his slouch against the wall. "Let's go now."

**A/N: Thanks to everyone who left reviews for the previous chapter; like everyone who writes, I love getting them! ****Those who are reading this but don't review, please do! (Hahaha, I'm a poet xD) Reviews are a writer's bread and butter. :)**


	5. Capture

**Disclaimer: I only own a few characters; everything recognisable belongs to Stephenie Meyer.**

Chapter Five: Capture

When night fell, they came for me.

I was standing in the kitchen, in the middle of the cleaning-up-after-dinner task that had become routine. Bella was elbow-deep in soapy water, scrubbing furiously at a stubborn plate. Kaitlin was sitting at the table – after having cleared it – doing her homework, scribbling away madly with her tongue sticking out in an attitude of intense concentration. I was methodically drying plates and cutlery, my mind on other things, when I heard them.

A whisper, a rushing noise, the sound of seven vampires speeding almost silently through the undergrowth of the forest, all heading directly towards our house.

I didn't allow myself to freeze; although the sudden panic almost choked me before I cut it off, not even letting myself register that the total number of vampires had now climbed from six to seven. I force myself to semi-calmly analyse all my options in about half a second, then dropped my mental shields. Another half second was all I needed before slamming the walls back up into place, just as the consciousness of the other mind-reader crashed full-force into them. My barriers held firm and he rebounded but I had already gained the information I needed. They all were focused intently on a single goal; me.

"Mira?" I became aware of Kaitlin's voice. Her head was tilted to the side inquiringly and both she and Bella were looking at me with concern. I realised I been frozen for several seconds with a grimace on my face. But there was no time to explain.

"Stay here!" I ordered, my tone harsh with fear. "No matter what happens, don't leave the house!" Not that that would present much of an obstacle to a vampire, but from that brief glimpse of their thoughts, they were entirely focused on me and I intended to keep it that way. If they weren't hunting my sisters to start with, there was no need to put the vampires into temptation's path.

Before they could ask or argue, I hurtled out of the kitchen, up the stairs, across the landing, through my bedroom and then fluidly launched myself out of the window. My leap easily carried me down two stories and I hit the grass in a graceful tumble, rolling up and onto my feet instantly.

I stood, poised on my toes for flight, as I listened hard. They were much closer now, though they were spreading out. Three of them were still running directly towards the house. One had stopped some distance behind those three. Two had peeled off, one to the right, one to the left and the last was circling around in a wide arc to come in from behind. I could feel the net being woven, designed to trap, with me at the centre.

I had merely fragments of seconds to decide what to do. The obvious choice was behind me; the weakest part of the net was the solitary figure who was still circling around, who had not yet closed off the avenue of escape behind me. However, some danger instinct tingled warningly; I sensed that this was a multilayered trap. If I fled in that direction, I would be presenting three of them with my vulnerable back and I would be running straight into the arms of another. One of them at least was a clever strategist; but, no. I would run in the opposite direction they expected me to – straight towards the three who were still directly approaching the house.

Decided, I threw caution to the wind, and dropped the shields around my thoughts as I sped across the lawn and into the forest. Holding up my mental walls was more a hindrance than a help at this point. The mind-reader would still be able to sense my whereabouts, no matter if the barriers were up or down; he would either hear my thoughts or feel the walls and I needed the advantage of hearing the thoughts of the vampires, more than I needed to protect my own thoughts from being heard.

_And to employ your extra skill,_ the nasty little voice that called itself my conscience hissed. _You need access to their thoughts for that._

I winced as I sped up, running even faster towards the three vampires, attempting to not give them a chance to process my strange decision. I had deduced from the instant I had felt them coming for me tonight, had known, even, since the first day that I had feared for my sisters' lives, that our – my at the moment – survival would most likely hinge on the odd ability that seemed to be a side effect of my mind-reading talent. That didn't mean I had to like it.

**Emmett's POV**

"What is she doing?"Jasper's incredulous question came from my left, as he, Rosalie and I tore through the forest.

I chuckled in amusement as we all listened to the girl racing _towards_ us. "Ruining your perfect plan, from the sound of it, brother. Guess she wasn't fooled by the trap; though it beats me why she's decided that running _to_ us will be a better way to escape than running_ from_ us."

"This isn't funny, Emmett!" Rosalie hissed, her golden eyes furious, as she kept pace with me on my right. "I don't want this to drag on any longer than it has to."

I sighed internally. I loved my Rose beyond all reason, but she did have a tendency to spoil my fun.

"She's almost here," Jasper said, becoming tense in preparation for the inevitable confrontation. We sprinted on, then, with a startling suddenness, we came upon the girl. I only caught a brief glimpse but was enough for my brain to process every detail. She was running towards us, blurring between the trees, vampire quick. Her cheeks were red with exertion and her breathing was fast and loud in my ears, along with her strange, fluttery, rapid pulse.

Then she leapt. Kicking off from a tree, she soared high in a powerful bound, right over our heads and landed in the lower tree canopy. We crashed to a halt and abruptly reversed direction, Rosalie and I continuing to race along on the forest floor underneath and slightly behind her, while Jasper jumped up into the network of branches to purse her on the same level.

"Eh, where's Edward when we really need his speed, huh?" I chuckled, thoroughly enjoying the chase. I was confident we would win. "Guess this proves the 'not human' theory though."

Rosalie huffed angrily through her nose; she hated being wrong. "Just concentrate on what you're doing, Emmett."

I chortled, speeding up. "As if I wouldn't! This is the most fun I've had in ages."

**Elimira's POV**

I ran faster than I had ever run in my whole life, trying not to let blind fear restrict my ability to think. I could hear two of the three vampires tearing through the forest below and the other one sprinting through the tree tops behind me.

My breaths came hard and fast and I felt the terror of the hunted; I now knew what it was to be prey.

I could sense the thoughts of the others spread out around me as I ran. The trap was disintegrating; I could feel the rest of the vampires converging on us, abandoning their positions. The mind-reader was the furthest away; I now knew he was the one who had been circling around to close the trap from behind. I could hear his frustration, his thoughts a jagged jumble as he pushed himself to the utmost to catch up to us. He wasn't getting much from me – I was deliberately allowing my fear to take centre stage in my mind in an attempt to keep deeper thoughts undetected.

The doctor was racing in from the north and the vampire I hadn't met before was coming in from the south. I gleaned from her mind that she was the doctor's mate; most of her thoughts were flashes of concern for him, along with the other vampires whom she thought of as... her _family?_

I shoved this startling revelation to the side for future analysis and pushed my legs to the utmost, squeezing out a tiny bit more speed. I was fast approaching the vampire – the pixie-like one – who had stopped when the other vampires had run on and spread out around my house. The thoughts of the vampire who was chasing me through the tree canopy were becoming increasingly concerned the closer I got to her. I realised that that vampire – I was pretty sure he was the terrifyingly scarred blond male – must be her mate and was scared that I might harm her. I snorted; a shaky sound that was equal parts terror and mirthless laughter. As if _I_ was the threat.

I reached the clearing that she was standing in the middle of, and saw her clearly before I jumped. A tiny figure, head cocked to the side, deep black hair and golden eyes glowing against her snow-white skin..._golden_ eyes?

This astonishing – _impossible_ – sight startled me so much I stumbled in mid-jump. Instead of my leap carrying me effortlessly from the trees on one side of the clearing to the other, I landed short of the tree line, my jump unbalanced, causing me to crash to the ground. I rolled back onto my feet instantly and leapt for the tree canopy again but a hand closed around my ankle.

Terror bloomed like a flower inside my chest as I was yanked back down to the ground. I crashed-landed on top of the vampire who had pulled me down by the ankle – the petite pixie – and I quickly pulled free, aided by the loosening of her grip, due to her surprise at me landing on her.

I regained my feet once more, only to be faced with two blonde vampires racing from the trees – the scarred one and the extraordinarily beautiful one. I backed away, heart pounding with fear and my back hit something solid. A pair of arms wrapped around me and my feet left the ground as the huge muscular vampire picked me up. I dangled in his grip, my arms pinned to my sides as I struggled helplessly – loosening his arms was like trying to pry a pair of steel girders loose.

"Gotcha," his booming laugh echoed close to my ear and I flinched away, my struggles growing more frantic as I realised that his grip was tight to the point I couldn't breathe. I thrashed, desperately trying to inhale; I was already short of breath from my fall to the ground and what little I had was being crushed out of my body.

"Le..t...go..." I rasped, my voice little more than a wheeze. My vision was darkening and my blood roared in ears. Dimly, I could hear the vampires talking but they sounded though they were coming from a long distance away.

_No! _The thought echoed around my head; it was not my mine but it jerked my failing consciousness into action. With a desperate lunge, I reached for the thoughts of the vampire unintentionally crushing me to death.

_LET GO!_

My mental scream had immediate effect; the arms holding me slackened instantly and I fell to the ground in a heap, sobbing for breath. I sucked in a huge lungful of air; trying to push back the darkness still threatening to claim me, but the stress and the fear pushed me over the edge and I slipped into unconsciousness.

**Edward's POV**

_No! _I thought furiously as I sprinted from the tree line, just behind Carlisle and Esme. Alice, Jasper and Rosalie were clustered around Emmett who was holding the struggling girl. He also completely obvious to the fact her struggles were more due to his grip being too tight for her to breathe, than a desire to escape.

I saw her jerk, heard her register my thought and then felt her reach out mentally in the direction of Emmett's thoughts and _scream_. Her thoughts blasted _out_, and I saw my siblings, my father and my mother all recoil as the sheer force of the mental command knocked them back a few steps. Emmett dropped the girl instantly and she collapsed to the ground, fighting for air, as I rubbed my temples grimacing at the shout that also reverberated around my head.

"What was _that_?" Alice exclaimed, her eyes huge with shock as she put voice to what all the others were thinking.

"I'm not sure..." I broke off as I became aware of the state of the girl's mind. "Emmett! She's about to faint!" I warned.

Her eyes closed as she slumped into the grass, losing the battle for consciousness.

"Oops," said Emmett guiltily, stooping to scoop her off the ground again.

"Gently," I said testily. "You were crushing her to death last time."

"I thought she was trying to escape!" protested Emmett, eyes wide with indignation. "Pretty reasonable assumption, I would think."

"You still could have slackened your grip enough for her to _breathe_ –"

"Never mind!" said Rosalie impatiently, cutting me off. "Answer Alice's question; what _was_ that?"

"I think..." I hesitated, rather annoyed at being interrupted, and all eyes turned to me. "I think _we_ heard _her_ thoughts – all of us did. She somehow...projected them...it almost felt like...instead of...well, normally, thoughts are like individual voices – voices that occupy the same space but don't ever touch or go outside of their own little bubble."

I paused, noticing through my family's thoughts how much I was hesitating and that they were thinking it was very unlike me to be uncertain. "I don't know, that's the trouble," I said in frustration. "I think, somehow, she pushed her thoughts outside the space that they are normally kept in, and that they intruded on the areas that normally occupied by other people's thoughts. That's the best I can explain what it felt like."

"But I thought you couldn't hear her at all," said Alice, tilting her confusion, while the others were busy turning the information over quietly in their heads.

I shook my head. "I couldn't. But suddenly – for no apparent reason – when she started running, the walls just fell away and I could hear her as clearly as I hear you. I don't know why I was suddenly able to hear her either; she wasn't thinking about it."

"So...what?" Rosalie's eyes narrowed. "She's some kind of supernatural creature – that much was evident merely from her speed – that can project her thoughts into our heads?"

"Yes," I said reluctantly, sensing Rosalie was building up to something here; but as to what, exactly, I was unsure. "But I rather suspect that she is also a mind reader."

There was silence. Nobody spoke but I heard the question in all their thoughts. "I'm almost completely certain. I was listening to her listening to you. It was the strangest thing I've ever heard; hearing everyone's thoughts but _twice_ – echoed through another's head. Utterly bizarre."

The silence held for a few more seconds, then Emmett chuckled. "So we have a thought-projecting mind reader with the speed of a vampire and the heartbeat of a hummingbird. I know this saying's overused but you really _don't _find something like this everyday."

**A/N: Thanks once again for the lovely reviews! :) In answer to the question that **zozorox **posed in their review, what I meant was the werewolves who were there in Jacob's grandfather's time (which was the last time the Cullens were in the Forks area) have all died off by now – the Cullens are as yet unaware of the new generation. Hope that helps :)**

**Those who are reading this but don't review, please do take the time :D I've been getting around five or six reviews per chapter; I'd love to have ten! :D Thanks!**


	6. Waking

**A/N: Hey, I'm not dead! xD I know I haven't posted on this story for months; Real Life unfortunately takes its toll. Also, frankly, I've not been very motivated. I pretty much have the basic plot outlined in my head – perhaps I'll get interested enough to finish it during the summer.**

**My muse is also currently off gallivanting in other fandoms and shows no interest in returning to this one at present. However I manage to squeeze out this chapter before she escaped and I've tweaked and polished it a little; it's more of an in-between stage but hopefully you'll like it.**

**Disclaimer: I only own a few characters; everything recognisable belongs to Stephenie Meyer.**

Chapter Six: Waking

**Elimira's POV**

I came back to consciousness suddenly, rising out of the black well of oblivion. I gasped as my memories and their accompanying emotions rushed back like a tsunami roaring in to crash down on an unprotected beach.

My eyes flew open and a brilliant light shone straight in my eyes, dazzling me. I tried to arch my body up and away instinctively, panic already clenched tightly in my gut, but pressure around my wrists and ankles instantly brought me thudding back down to the surface I was secured to. The discovery of the fact I couldn't move instantly triggered wild, unreasoning panic and I reacted with the instinct of a caged creature. A wild shriek burst from my lips as I thrashed and bucked against the restraints holding my wrists and ankles.

"Carlisle! She's awake!" _Oh, no, please calm down!_

"I'm here, Alice." _She's going to injure herself..._

I was vaguely aware of voices, both physical and mental, but the words were confused, jumbled, streaming through my frightened mind without registering or even making sense. The bright light was still blinding me and I shut my eyes as I struggled wildly, my frozen brain stuck and screaming on the single urgent word: _Flee!_

"Get Jasper and Emmett, quickly."

Footsteps and a cool finger pressed on my neck. Then something dropped over my eyes and was quickly secured. I slewed around, snapping instinctively at the touch but my teeth closed on nothing. I tried opening my eyes but they only met a swathe of dark fabric with points of the brilliant light piercing through.

A sound like rushing air. "Sleeping Beauty's finally awake, then?" A deep chuckle echoed around the room.

I strained hard, arching my body up off the surface, pushing all my weight against the wrist restraints and I heard them give an ominous groan, the sound of stressed metal.

"Uh, oh. Stay where you are."_ Led us a merry dance already; not that it wasn't fun, mind you._

A pair of enormous hands curled around my comparatively tiny wrists, holding them gently but firmly in place.

The relatively mildness of the hold was lost on my panic and a deep snarl ripped from my chest as I tried to bite the hands.

"Tougher than she looks." Delighted amusement in the voice.

"So am I, Emmett," snapped a higher voice, vibrating with stress. _And so help me, but I _will_ rip your head off if you frighten her anymore._ "Edward says you're just panicking her more. She isn't thinking at all, just reacting."

"I agree," agreed someone in a smoother, lower tone. My stress inexplicably eased slightly at the sound of it.

"Then can't you do something about it?" asked the first male voice, sounding as though they were enjoying themselves. "Emotions are your thing."

"I can calm her down a little but she's too lost in the panic. Carlisle should sedate her again." _What _is_ she? _Intense curiosity. _She can't be a vampire, no matter what Emmett insists. Vampires don't respond to the sedatives humans use._

Fear spiked through me as these comments floated through my head, though I didn't quite know why. I tried wrenching my hands free again but the grip on them merely tightened slightly.

There was silence for a few seconds apart from the swirling of thoughts and my growls as I struggled in vain.

Then footsteps approached my head again and I snarled, snapping my teeth in warning as I felt someone reach for me.

Hesitation.

"Jasper?"

My growls redoubled as I felt the vampire holding my wrists shift slightly to make room for someone new. A pair of cold hands pressed themselves firmly on either side of my head and I bucked frantically, terror shooting to new heights as my head was anchored to the table, completely restricting my freedom of movement.

"Quickly, Carlisle." _The longer this goes on, the more stressed she gets._ The thoughts were tinged with sympathy and impatience.

"I know." Someone moved swiftly to stand beside the other two vampires restraining me. It was now getting rather crowded around my head and my instincts were screaming _bad, bad, bad!_ at me, frantic with fear at the prospect of three strange vampire clustered around me while I was blinded and pinned down.

Cool fingers tapped my jaw and I lunged forward in an automatic bite. Too late, I realised the intention behind the move and liquid was flooded into my mouth as I opened it to bite. A hand firmly fastened on my jaws, holding them shut to stop me spitting it out, and another set of fingers pinched my nose closed.

A howl of fury strangled in my throat as I thrashed in a desperate attempt to break the hold, to avoid swallowing the liquid. I held on stubbornly until I completely ran out of air and only then did I reluctantly swallow. The liquid burned its way down my throat and my face was instantly released, leaving me gasping for breath.

Whatever it was, it had an immediate effect; a warm lethargy stole over me, mugging my panic into submission. I tried to raise my head but it was suddenly too heavy to lift. My limbs became leaden and a dizzying, dark, warmth enfolded my increasingly fuzzy thoughts. I slipped once more into unconsciousness.

xxx

This time I rose back to consciousness slowly. I opened my eyes slowly and looked around the room calmly. It was panelled in dark wood and the walls were lined with bookcases. Floor-length glass windows stood partially open at the far end of the room, white net curtains billowing slightly in the draught.

I was lying on what looked like a modified hospital bed; four iron cuffs were welded to the edges. They appeared to have suffered some damage though; I noted, with a vague sense of satisfaction, that the metal had buckled and warped.

I sat up slowly. I aware that I was far too calm. They must have drugged me with more than a sedative but the oppressive calm blanketing my senses meant I couldn't feel anything more than a distant sense of alarm.

The light tapping of footsteps outside the room I was in signalled the approach of two people. I tensed slightly as the door swung open, then the pixie-vampire tripped lightly into the room. She was closely followed by the scarred male, hovering over her like an over-protective shadow.

"Hi! I'm Alice Cullen," she beamed brightly at me. "This is my mate, Jasper." The tiny vampire – Alice – smiled adoringly up at her terrifying lover. He returned the look with equal devotion, and then instantly flicked his gaze back to me, reverting to his wary, guarded look.

I opened my mouth to speak, then coughed when I realised how dry my throat was. "I'm Elimira Swan. But then you already knew that. And I already knew your names."

Alice nodded. "But Edward said you still don't refer to us by our names in your head. It was just in case you weren't sure."

I just stared at her. Of course I didn't refer to them by name. Up until a few seconds ago, they had been labelled only as 'dangerous vampires' in my head. They hadn't quite been real to me, hadn't quite been people; only a threat.

Now I was confused. They hadn't killed me, or drained me dry – indeed they were showing remarkable self-control – and they didn't seem at all inclined to do so in the near future.

I decided to go for the jugular. Figuratively. "I'm going to be blunt," I said, as much as I was afraid of the answer. "Why did you kidnap me? I'm not dead and you don't appear to be keeping me around as a snack either. Why am I here?"

Alice and Jasper exchanged a look. "So you know what we are?" asked Jasper. His voice was smooth but I could hear the hint of underlying threat.

I frowned. "Of course. I would have to be pretty stupid not to notice."

They swapped another meaningful look. "Then you have us at a disadvantage," chimed Alice in her clear voice. "Because we do not know what _you_ are. Because you are clearly not human; that much is certain."

"Is that what this is about?" I asked, my stomach flipping nervously.

Jasper's eyes were inscrutable. "Perhaps. In any case, we must wait for the others to return. They are not home at present."

I swallowed apprehensively, then frowned as I realised that my shields were down, my mind undefended. I could 'hear' Edward in the background, listening intently to our thoughts. I was about to raise them again when I noticed Jasper's mind and instantly realised the source of my unnatural calm.

"You're an empath!" I said in astonishment and more than a little anger. His mind was so focused on channelling waves of calm to me that this fact jumped out at me without me even trying to glean it from his thoughts. "Stop doing that to me!"

Even as the anger spread through me, I felt him smooth it back out into serenity. "Stop that," I repeated, but my voice lacked bite now, thanks to his manipulation.

"Sorry." Jasper sounded utterly unrepentant. "But you were panicking wildly. And if you can't keep control of yourself, I'll have to do it for you. I won't tolerate threats to my family."

"Well, you wouldn't exactly be in the best state of mind, either, if you'd been attacked, knocked out and woke up, tied down, in an unfamiliar place," I snapped, stung by his remark.

_I suppose you may have a point._ Jasper's expression didn't alter but his thoughts were distinctly amused.

"You know fine well I have a point," I said acidly. My anger was washed away almost instantly. _"Stop doing that!"_

Alice giggled. "It's okay, Jazzy. I still can't see Mira's future but I don't see us being attacked in _our_ futures. You can ease up on the calming vibes."

I blinked at her in astonishment, barely even registering Jasper's absolute trust in his mate's judgement as he toned down the waves of serenity. "You can see the future? You're a _seer_?" Then her other comment registered. "And you can't see mine?"

Alice bobbed her head in confirmation. "Yep. All the time. But I don't know why I can't see your future; I was actually hoping that _you_ could tell me why. Along with – not meaning to sound rude or anything – exactly what kind of creature you are. I think that may have something to do with it."

Jasper's gaze fastened on me now too; his stare was intent, bordering on predatory, while Alice was watching me with an avid, eager curiosity. I shrank back under the combined weight of their gazes, my heart rate picking up in fear.

_Can't tell, can't tell, Dad said not to, no one can know…_

Too late, I became aware of Edward's mind listening to my panicked thought-stream with extreme interest. _What is it? What can't we know?_

I slammed my mind closed against his demands and pressed myself back against the dark-panelled wall, my hands pressed over my ears as his thoughts battered on my shields. "Stop it!" I yelled out loud. _"_Stop it!_ Edward!"_ My voice had risen to a high-pitched shriek by the end, pain shooting through my head as my shields shook under the pressure of Edward's insistent thoughts.

He instantly withdrew, his mind radiating contrition and apology.

Only then did I become aware of my physical surroundings again. I realised I was shaking and a pair of slim, cool arms were wrapped around me in a gentle but unyielding embrace.

**Alice's POV**

The girl looked up at me, brilliant green eyes wide with fear and swimming with unshed tears. I hadn't even stopped to think about my reaction; it had been entirely instinctive to fly across the room and cradle her in my arms in an attempt to comfort her. Perhaps Rosalie ought to give me more credit for my mothering instincts.

I could feel Jasper's shocked disapproval as he hovered over us. I knew his concern was misplaced though. I didn't need to be a seer to know that Mira wouldn't hurt me.

I widened my mind, broadcasting_ my _disapproval, knowing Edward would pick it up in my thoughts. I didn't know what he'd done, but she'd seemed in genuine pain.

"Make yourself useful, Edward," I commanded, gaze still fixed on the girl in my arms. "Go fetch the others." There was a whoosh of air downstairs and he was gone.

Mira drew in a deep breath and let it out again, blinking back her tears hard. She wriggled back slightly in my grip, and I released her, acknowledging the unspoken request.

I leapt fluidly to my feet and offered her a hand. She eyed it warily, and then grasped it firmly. I pulled her easily to her feet and asked gently, "Would you like to come downstairs? Edward has gone to fetch the rest of the family. You can meet us all properly."

Mira stared at me for a few moments, expression unreadable. Then she nodded.

I guided her out of the room, walking at a normal human pace. She glanced around nervously, taking in our house with darting glances, as though she were afraid to look at any part of it for too long. I hoped she was admiring the furnishings; Esme and I had had enormous fun decorating the house and the seven of us were the only ones who ever normally got to appreciate it.

I could sense her unease at Jasper walking directly behind her, though. I shot Jasper a reassuring look over my shoulder. _Really, it's okay,_ I told him with my eyes.

He looked back at me and I read the meaning in his gaze as clearly as if he'd spoken it. _Just in case. I want you to be safe._

I sighed and rolled my eyes in exasperation but I was secretly pleased. And of course, he knew that.

We descended the stairs into the living room, to find Edward and the others arriving at the same time, walking in through the front door. Mira came to an abrupt halt at the foot of the stairs. I placed a hand on her back in silent reassurance and felt the wave of calm as it pulsed past me from Jasper to Mira. I saw her stiff shoulders relax slightly, then she half-turned to shoot a quick glare at Jasper as she realised what he'd done. He merely grinned, totally unapologetic.

With a quiet huff, Mira turned around to face Carlisle, Esme, Rosalie, Emmett and Edward.


End file.
